THE INDIAN AT HOME
Although among the graduates and ex-students of the Indian schools there
are now some in almost every modern occupation, including commerce, the
trades and professions, the great majority of these young people, as of
their fellow tribesmen who lack an English education, are farmers,
ranchers, and stockmen. Nearly all Indians own some land, either
individually or in common; and while it may generally be leased by those
who are either unable or for good reasons do not desire to work it
themselves, this is done under such troublesome restrictions and
conditions that it is, as a general rule, better for the owner to live
on and utilize his allotment. Of course this is a rule that admits of
many exceptions.
THE PROBLEM OF SELF-SUPPORT
Since most Indian reservations are in the arid belt and the greater
portion of the land is therefore unsuited to agriculture, at least
without extensive irrigation, perhaps the larger number of the men are
stock-raisers, an occupation well suited to the Plains Indians, who are
great riders and very fond of their horses. They raise both horses and
cattle, and many have become well-to-do from this source. From time to
time their herds are improved by well-bred stallions and mares and
blooded cattle, furnished by the Government under treaty stipulations.
The total valuation of stock belonging to Indians, both individual and
tribal, is now twenty-two million dollars in round numbers, according to
the tables furnished by the Indian Bureau. This estimate includes sheep,
goats, and poultry. The Navajoes, who number about 22,000 and are in a
fairly primitive state, having few schools or missionaries among them,
are thrifty and successful sheep-herders and entirely self-supporting.
The value of crops raised by Indians during the last fiscal year is
estimated at more than four millions.
In a word, the typical red man of to-day is a rancher on a large or
small scale. He has displayed quite as much intelligence and aptitude
for the work as could be expected. There have been serious handicaps,
other than the tradition among us that the cultivation of the soil is a
feminine rather than a manly occupation. I may mention the occupation of
the best lands by white settlers, with or without our consent; the
ration system; and the "spoils system" as applied to the appointment of
our superintendents and instructors in farming.
Take the Sioux, for example--a strong and self-respecting people who had
shown a willingness to fight for their rights when it became necessary.
They were presently corralled upon reservations in a land of little
rain, and given enough food to sustain life, under a solemn engagement
to continue feeding "until they became self-supporting." There was scant
opportunity and still less inducement to become so; accordingly only a
few of the more ambitious or energetic worked at teaming or whatever
they could get to do, improved their homes, acquired stock, and
gradually fought their way upward. For many years this clause in the
treaty was not applied to individuals; that is, it was interpreted to
mean that all should receive rations until all became self-supporting.
Twenty years ago, when I lived among them as agency doctor, Government
and mission workers of Indian blood, well-to-do mixed bloods, and
intermarried white men all drew their rations regularly, with very few
exceptions.
About a dozen years ago tardy steps were taken to carry out the evident
intention of the treaty, which had hitherto been defeated by keeping it
to the letter. Rations were withdrawn from all who had other sufficient
means of support. This seemed like imposing a penalty upon industry; but
it was soon followed by requiring all able-bodied men to perform a
certain amount of labor for the common benefit, such as road-making,
bridge building, etc., in return for money or rations. This was a great
advance even though accompanied by some evils, notably the neglect of
allotments while their families camped with the gangs of laborers on
different parts of the reservation. Later, the same credit was allowed
for days' labor performed in improving their own homesteads and putting
up hay for their cattle. More cows and better farming implements have
been issued in recent years, and there is a wholesome effort to make the
work of the so-called agency or "district farmers" less of a farce than
it has often been in the past.
These farmers number about 250 and are employees of the Indian service.
They are supposed to instruct and assist the Indians of their
respective districts in modern methods of agriculture; but there has
been a time, probably not altogether past, when they were occupied
chiefly in drawing water, filling ice-houses, and a variety of similar
"chores" for the agent and his subordinates. In many cases they
themselves knew little of practical farming, or their experience lay in
a soil and climate utterly unlike that of the Indian country to which
they came.
Hon. Cato Sells, the present Commissioner of Indian Affairs, states in
his first annual report that he is placing more emphasis upon
agriculture than upon any other activity of the Indian Bureau. He
requires the farmers to make their homes in the districts to which they
are assigned, and to keep in close touch with the people. They are
furnished with modern agricultural text-books, and demonstration farms
or experiment stations are maintained at convenient points. Thirty-seven
practical stockmen have also been employed to give special attention to
this part of the work, and the Indians are said to be cooperating
intelligently in the effort to improve their breeding stock.
At certain agencies farming implements and seed are loaned to Indians
who have no other means of securing them, and hundreds who have been so
helped are meeting their payments when due with commendable promptness.
Agricultural fairs have been held in recent years at twenty or more
Indian agencies, arousing much local interest, and an increasing number
of Indian farmers are taking part in county and state fairs.
In several of the Northwestern States the value of the timber on Indian
lands is enormous; the latest official estimate is eighty-four million
dollars. If the Indian had been allowed to cut his own pine and run his
own sawmills, we should now have native lumber kings as well as white.
This is not permitted, however; and a paternal Government sells the
stumpage for the benefit of its wards, who are fortunate if the money
received for it has not seeped out of the official envelope or withered
away of the prevailing disease called "political consumption."
The irrigation force of the Bureau consists of an inspector and seven
subordinates, who supervise irrigation projects on the various
reservations, upon which more than half a million dollars was expended
during the last fiscal year. The protection of water rights, notably
those of the Pimas in Arizona, a peaceful and industrious tribe who
have suffered severely from the loss of their water at the hands of
unprincipled white men, is of primary importance.
Oil and gas, especially in Oklahoma, are proving enormously valuable,
and are being mined under leases executed by the Bureau. Many Indians
are becoming well-to-do from the payment of royalties, but it cannot be
doubted that the biggest prizes go, as usual, to our white brothers.
The Indian office maintains an employment bureau to assist in finding
profitable work for Indians, particularly returned students, and I am
informed from trustworthy sources that it has met with fair success. It
is headed by a Carlisle graduate, Charles E. Dagenett, who was trained
for a business career. Considerable numbers of Indians, particularly in
the Southwest, are provided with employment in the sugar-beet fields,
in harvesting canteloupes and other fruits, in railroad construction,
irrigation projects, and other fields of activity, and it appears that
their work gives general satisfaction.
INDIAN WOMEN AS HOME-MAKERS
Probably the average white man still believes that the Indian woman of
the old days was little more than a beast of burden to her husband. But
the missionary who has lived among his people, the sympathetic observer
of their every-day life, holds a very different opinion. You may
generally see the mother and her babe folded close in one shawl,
indicating the real and most important business of her existence.
Without the child, life is but a hollow play, and all Indians pity the
couple who are unable to obey the primary command, the first law of real
happiness.
She has always been the silent but telling power behind life's
activities, and at the same time shared equally with her mate the
arduous duties of primitive society. Possessed of true feminine dignity
and modesty, she was expected to be his equal in physical endurance and
skill, but his superior in spiritual insight. She was looked to for the
endowment of her child with nature's gifts and powers, and no woman of
any race has ever come closer to universal mother-hood.
She was the spiritual teacher of the child, as well as its tender nurse,
and she brought its developing soul before the "Great Mystery" as soon
as she was aware of its coming. When she had finished her work, at the
age of five to eight years, she turned her boy over to his father for
manly training, and to the grandparents for traditional instruction, but
the girl child remained under her close and thoughtful supervision. She
preserved man from soul-killing materialism by herself owning what few
possessions they had, and thus branding possession as feminine. The
movable home was hers, with all its belongings, and she ruled there
unquestioned. She was, in fact, the moral salvation of the race; all
virtue was entrusted to her, and her position was recognized by all. It
was held in all gentleness and discretion, under the rule that no woman
could talk much or loudly until she became a grandmother.
The Indian woman suffered greatly during the transition period of
civilization, when men were demoralized by whiskey, and possession
became masculine. The division of labor did not readily adjust itself to
the change, so that her burdens were multiplied while her influence
decreased. Tribe after tribe underwent the catastrophe of a disorganized
and disunited family life.
To-day, I am glad to say, we have still reason to thank our Indian
mothers for the best part of our manhood. A great many of them are
earnest Christian women, who have carried their native uprightness and
devoted industry over into the new life. The annual reports of the
missionaries show large sums, running into the thousands of dollars,
raised by the self-denying labor of the native women for the support of
their churches and other Christian work.
As the men have gradually assumed the responsibility of the outdoor
toil, cultivating the fields and building the houses, the women have
undertaken the complicated housekeeping tasks of their white sisters. It
is true that until they understood the civilized way of cooking and the
sanitation of stationary homes, the race declined in health and vigor.
For the great improvement noticeable in these directions, much credit is
due to the field matrons of the Indian Service.
The field matron is sometimes called the "Going-around woman," or the
"Clean-up woman," and her house-to-house teaching and inspection is
undoubtedly of much practical value. She is often the physician's right
hand in follow-up work among his patients, especially the women and
children. Some of the most efficient women in the service are themselves
of Indian blood, such as Mrs. Annie Dawson Wilde of Fort Berthold, a
graduate of Hampton and of a state normal school, who has given many
years to this work. Similar instruction is sometimes given by day-school
teachers and woman missionaries.
MARRIAGE AND THE FAMILY
The social morality of the various tribes differs very much at the
present time. Under our original customs, the purity of woman and the
home was safeguarded by strict rules, with severe penalties for their
transgression. When, however, native customs were broken down without
the efficient substitution of civilized laws, there was much social
irregularity.
Plural marriages were permissible under our system, but were not very
general, and plural wives were usually sisters. The missionaries, and in
some instances the Federal authorities, have required elderly men to
abandon all but one wife, leading to difficult problems. Many of the
younger generation are now legally married, and an effort is made to
oblige them to secure legal divorces when a separation is sought, but as
some state courts hold that they have no jurisdiction to hear
applications of non-citizen Indians living on reservations, this is
often impracticable, and naturally the dissatisfied simply abandon wife
or husband, and perhaps take another by Indian custom only. It is
advisable that family records be more strictly kept than is now the
case.
UNEDUCATED LEADERS AMONG INDIANS
I wish to refute the common misconception that it is only the educated
and Christian Indian who has contributed to the progress of his people
and to the common good of both races. There are many men wholly
unlettered, and some of whom have not proclaimed themselves followers of
Christ, who have yet exerted great influence on the side of
civilization. Almost every tribe has a hero of this type who arose at a
critical juncture to lead his fellows.
In the early part of the nineteenth century there was Little Turtle, a
celebrated Miami chief, who, to be sure, defended his country bravely,
but when he made a treaty he stood by it faithfully, and advocated peace
and civilization for his people. The Pottawatomie chief Pokagon was
another, whose son Simon Pokagon was prominent at the World's Fair in
Chicago. A leading contemporary of these men was Keokuk of the Sacs and
Foxes. Wabashaw the third, of the Mississippi Sioux, was known as a
strong friend to civilization; and so was my own great-grandfather,
Chief Cloud Man, whose village occupied the present site of the city of
Minneapolis. His son, Appearing Sacred Stone, whose English name was
David Weston, was a fine character--a hereditary chief who took a
homestead at Flandreau and became a native preacher under Bishop Hare.
Chief Strike-the-Ree, by whose influence and diplomacy the Yankton Sioux
were kept neutral throughout the Sioux wars; Lone Wolf of the Kiowas,
Quanah Parker of the Comanches, whose mother was a white captive, and
Governor James Big Heart of the Osages were all men of this type,
natural leaders and statesmen. Iron Eyes, or Joseph La Flesche, a head
chief of the Omahas, was a notable leader in progressive ways; and so is
John Grass of the Blackfoot Sioux, also a distinguished orator.
Men like this, of native force and fire, but without advantages other
than those shared by the mass of their people, are possibly more
deserving of honor than are the few who have made the most of
exceptional opportunities. If anything, they illustrate more clearly the
innate capacity and moral strength of the race.
When it is considered that of the three hundred and odd thousand
Indians in the United States, only about two thirds are still living on
reservations under the control of the Indian Bureau, the official
figures concerning that two thirds are surprising to most of us. We are
told that 50,000 able-bodied adults are entirely self-supporting, and
that only 17,000 Indians of all classes are receiving rations.
Twenty-two thousand are employed on wages and salaries, earning more
than two million dollars yearly. Three fourths of the families live in
permanent houses; 100,000 persons speak English, and 161,000 wear
citizen's clothing. Such is the average present-day Indian at home--a
man who earns his own living, speaks the language of the country, wears
its dress, and obeys its laws. Surely it is but one step further to
American citizenship!